


you can't wake up (this is not a dream)

by chemicalpixie



Category: Badlands - Halsey (Album)
Genre: 2nd Person, Alcohol, Drug Use, F/F, I'm so sorry, sex mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-12
Updated: 2016-07-12
Packaged: 2018-07-23 16:58:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7471818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chemicalpixie/pseuds/chemicalpixie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“you said you'd never go back to the badlands, but here you are.</p><p>there's only an old sign so you know where you are.</p><p>it used to say something else, but you can't quite make out what.</p><p>the slightly faded red paint reading, "welcome to the badlands," is so much more prominent.</p><p>and you take a breath, and step forward.”</p><p>or; the feeling of unease you get when you come home and realize that everything has changed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you can't wake up (this is not a dream)

**Author's Note:**

> this was written forever ago for a badlands thing by a halsey blog. i don't even remember what it was now tbh.

you said you'd never go back to the badlands, but here you are.

there's only an old sign so you know where you are.

it used to say something else, but you can't quite make out what.

the slightly faded red paint reading, "welcome to the badlands," is so much more prominent.

and you take a breath, and step forward.

//

you get sick when you come back. everyone does. some say the badland's way of testing you, to see if you're worthy enough to return after you left. the badlands doesn't take kindly to betrayal.

you thrash in the bed that you found, sweat dampening the sheets. you hallucinate dead children, your sister among them, with hallowed out eyes, and devils the likes of which god wouldn't have touched.

when you get over your sickness, you look through your journal. there are names written over and over, chants in languages you've never learned. you throw it out at the soonest possible opportunity. you'll get a new one soon enough.

//

there's a girl with a haunting smile and dark shadows under her eyes that you see outside your apartment sometimes.

you know where she comes from. you came from there, too. only you didn't end up nearly as bad as her. when your sister died, you could still leave.

and you did. you can't decide if you regret it now.

of course, it meant you got away from this place.

but you don't think you really lived. not at all, in all those years you were gone.

and here? you're living every second. every cell of yours is alive and on fire.

for the first time in years, you're alive.

//

you slept with the girl with hallowed out eyes. you never learned her name.

if you had to guess, you'd call her the badlands incarnate, or some kind of deity, sent from above to save your soul or take it.

in the drugged out haze you were in, it almost felt good. right. like you were home.

you hadn't felt like that since you left.

your friends from back home message you, telling you that this place can't be good for you and to come home.

you ignore their messages. you feel better in the badlands than you have in years. the badlands are your home.

//

the badlands give, and the badlands take.

the girl you'd seen, with the hallowed eyes and haunted smile is gone. the badlands have taken her.

you knew you shouldn't get attached. the badlands always takes everything you love away.

you didn't love her, but she reminded you of the person you used to be.

you didn't love her, but you loved the idea of her.

you didn't love her, but you fucked her.

of course, you're still here, so you never ended up like her. you were stronger than her.

//

there are things in the badlands that whisper to you. they never shut up, and so you never get any peace inside your own head.

you're used to it.

there's also the hissing chorus of the winds when it runs through the abandoned buildings and shattered windows. it's always the same.

your friends from outside tell you its the city, all the bad memories getting to you, but you don't know why they say bad. your memories are anything but.

//

there were train tracks, where you went when you left, and you'd walk down them for hours, never able to decide if you just missed the endlessness of the badlands, or if you just wanted to die.

you're still not sure.

you kept your head down, you made friends, you tried your best to forget about the badlands - forever.

but you just couldn't get it out of your head.

so you came back, hoping to silence the whispers that your sister's death was your fault, the whispers that you left because you ran away from your guilt.

you came back to see everything again, to be glad you had left, and, instead, you found just the opposite.

//

the girl with the haunting smile shows up in your dreams sometimes. she's always more malicious there, like something's twisting her into something dark.  
you fuck there, in your dreams, and you think for a moment that you love her, but then you wake up and realize that she's gone, and not sleeping beside you.  
you can't get her out of your head. she's another ghost, a member of the chorus of pretty girls in your head.

your sister is one too.

they're with you, everywhere. forever. they're haunting you.

//

the only time they leave you alone to think is when you're high.

when you discover this, you're higher than a kite on anything cheap you can find.

you need some peace and quiet for once.

it can't hurt you too bad, right?

the badlands wouldn't let anything happen to you.

why would they?

they need you to function, and you need them.

you don't know why you ever left.

//

there's cheap booze at the corner store that tastes like blueberries.

you think it drowns out the sour taste you always get in your mouth when you lie.

you lie a lot these days, but mostly to your old friends. you tell them you're coming back, but you know you won't.

you won't leave again, because you know if you do, you can never come back.

it's okay, though, because you don't want to leave. why would you?

you tell them that you're coming home, when in reality, you're already there.

you know that you belong to the badlands, and the badlands belong to you. you are finally home.


End file.
